Re: The real reason that unemployment lines won't shrink.
- From: another fake name by Sordo above <nobody@xxxxxxxxxxx>
- Date: Wed, 09 Dec 2009 10:29:45 -0800
The above posting is Sordo. He's posting with a fake
name again because although he's unable to compose
anything original of much interest himself, he wishes to
monopolize the group anyway, by constantly making up
new fake names in order to avoid killfiles. He gets few
replies, even fewer if he doesn't disguise his identity,
because most people aren't much interested in reading
copy-and-paste political commentary in a discussion
group, which (other than catcalls) is all most of Sordo's
posts are.
On Wed, 09 Dec 2009 10:21:41 -0800, G Arrowsmith <nobody@xxxxxxxxxxx>
wrote:
Economics No Match For Politics
Richard A. Epstein, 12.08.09, 12:01 AM EST
http://www.forbes.com
The real reason that unemployment lines won't shrink.
Last year, even at the height of Obamamania, the president's ardent
supporters questioned whether he possessed the technical skills or
practical experience needed to deal with the domestic economy. My own
view was that Obama's archaic New Deal world view was sure to lead him
astray. Not to worry, I was told. He was a responsible and intelligent
centrist, who would rely on good professional advisors to fill in the
gaps in his knowledge and experience base.
The recent "upbeat" news is that the level of unemployment has leveled
off at about 10% after its earlier climb this year. And just what has
been the role of his professional advisors in the sorry performance of
the last 10 months? To tell, it appears, the president exactly what he
and his political advisors want to hear.
Exhibit A is Christina Romer's recent Wall Street Journal column,
"Putting Americans Back to Work." Romer heads the president's Council of
Economic Advisers. Her column rates as a bit of transparent propaganda
that belongs in a fan magazine, not a serious newspaper. If she wrote it
of her own volition, she should be fired for economic incompetence. If,
as seems more likely, the White House wrote it for her, or told her just
what to say, she should resign in protest.
Her column contains nine awestruck references to presidential
omniscience and benevolence. Its opening sally placesall the blame on
the Bush administration, by claiming that Obama took office at "the
height of the worst downturn since the great depression." Funny that she
failed to mention the tumultuous events of September and October 2008
had cooled off before then. Nor, of course, did Obama "stop the economic
free fall" in those tempestuous autumn days, unless Moses also parted
the Red Sea.
Worse still, she blindly celebrates Obama's worst economic blunders as
his greatest triumphs. The $787 billion stimulus package in the American
Recovery and Reinvestment Act was a bust. Its protectionist "Buy
American" provisions remain a perpetual irritant to international trade.
The warped Cash for Clunkers program created a short bubble via a
massive public giveaway, while doing nothing to help the environment.
Why, one might ask, with all these supposedly farsighted maneuvers on
the books, does the president still face a "weak" employment market?
Romer offers no explanation for how Obama's wise decisions made matters
worse. Instead she hyped Obama's inconclusive meeting with various
community leaders that took place the next day.
High on its agenda was an investigation of public-private partnerships
that could, at best, only usher in yet another round of economic
gimmicks. No credible economist could think that "direct incentives of
homeowners to retrofit their homes to improve energy efficiency" could
place a dent in the ranks of the 15.4 million unemployed. Far more
likely is a replay of the older story: subsidies for these programs sop
up wealth and thus kill sensible job opportunities elsewhere.
Instead of her presidential genuflection, Romer should have given this
blunt advice to the president:
You can only improve labor markets by freeing them up. Scrap the talk
about goofy ad hoc subsidies, and tell the president, for the first time
in his life, to think hard about deregulation. Roll back the three
recent minimum-wage increases that have blunted job creation for
low-skilled workers in a stagnant labor market. Announce he will veto
any effort by Congress to pass the Employer Free Choice Act, whose
uncertain threat of compulsory unionization has prompted many businesses
to shelve any plans for expansion. Abandon the monstrous health care
bills winding through Congress, whose panoply of taxes, subsidies and
regulations are job killers of the first magnitude. Put a halt on
legislation for carbon caps and taxes until the science gets sorted out.
Don't let the EPA make a hasty endangerment finding on carbon dioxide.
Deregulation costs nothing to administer, increases jobs and adds to the
tax base. It is only an added benefit that sound economics reduces
presidential power.
So how then does Romer come to serve her readers such intellectual
pabulum? Simply because Obama's policies are not shaped by his vaunted
professional advisors but by political operatives who answer solely to
Rahm Emanuel and David Axelrod. Their joint knowledge on economics is
negligible at best. Their political agenda is to win elections by buying
off enough of the electorate to form a winning political coalition. Any
libertarian has to be dismayed (but not surprised) at this systematic
misuse of political power.
The president's basic gut instinct is to offset every unwise market
restraint with an equally foolish government subsidy. Romer should
understand this basic point and fight it with every bone in her body.
But that won't happen so long as professional advisors always take a
backseat to the political ones.
Richard A. Epstein is the James Parker Hall Distinguished Service
Professor of Law, The University of Chicago, The Peter and Kirsten
Bedford Senior Fellow, The Hoover Institution, and a visiting professor
at New York University Law School.
The above posting is Sordo. He's posting with a fake
name again because although he's unable to compose
anything original of much interest himself, he wishes to
monopolize the group anyway, by constantly making up
new fake names in order to avoid killfiles. He gets few
replies, even fewer if he doesn't disguise his identity,
because most people aren't much interested in reading
copy-and-paste political commentary in a discussion
group, which (other than catcalls) is all most of Sordo's
posts are.
.
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